Mark Pack

A political prediction which didn’t turn out too well

By | Wed 10th February 2010 - 10:20 am

“Whatever happens in the election this week it is not going to make all that much difference” – Peregrine Worsthone, just before the 1979 general election in which Margaret Thatcher defeated Jim Callaghan.

Hey ho.

Mind you, even in the first few months after the 1979 general election he was far from alone in the view that the choice in 1979 between Labour and Conservative was an incremental one rather than one of major choice.

In large part that is because – with one notable exception – the 1979 Conservative manifesto avoid radical specifics and the campaign itself saw both Sir Keith Joseph and Tony Benn – the two most vocal exponents of radical difference on each side of the Tory/Labour divide – largely sidelined.

Hugely controversial issues such as privatisation were not even in the Conservative manifesto. The one exception was direct taxes, such as income tax, where the manifesto was clear about the Conservatives’ determination to cut them (despite what some, such as Francis Maude, have since claimed in an attempt to justify the vagueness over the current short-term Conservative tax plans).

Read more by or more about , , , or .
This entry was posted in News.
Advert

One Comment

Post a Comment

Lib Dem Voice welcomes comments from everyone but we ask you to be polite, to be on topic and to be who you say you are. You can read our comments policy in full here. Please respect it and all readers of the site.

To have your photo next to your comment please signup your email address with Gravatar.

Your email is never published. Required fields are marked *

*
*
Please complete the name of this site, Liberal Democrat ...?

Advert



Recent Comments

  • Simon R
    @Michael: You appear to be questioning my liberalism. But, like it or not, the nature of the Universe is that people have to work because - bluntly, if everyone...
  • Michael BG
    Peter Martin, I do accept that the economy needs people to do paid work to work. However, each individual makes choices and are not therefore forced to pay t...
  • Roger Lake
    This is -- or ought to be!-- amazing! And alarming. So far there are 12 reasoned responses to my title, most of them finding fault with my recommended propos...
  • Steve Trevethan
    Might being sufficiently frightened of the main stream media, to the extent that a political party does not tell reasonable approximations of (socio-economic) t...
  • Geoff Reid
    The usual good sense from Peter Wrigley. The Conservatives and their media cheer leaders cannot get their heads round the possibility of higher taxes helping to...